PLANT: Shrubs, armed or unarmed. STEMS: spreading to erect, green-brown to gray, pubescent to glabrous. LEAVES: evergreen or deciduous, alternate or opposite, entire or dentate, acute to rounded, palmately to pinnately veined. INFLORESCENCE: of cymose panicles. FLOWERS: perfect, pedicellate; sepals 5, white to light blue or purple; petals 5, 3-5 mm long, long-clawed, white to light blue or purple. FRUITS: 3-chambered capsules, green maturing dark brown to black, globose, roughened; seeds 1 per chamber. NOTES: Ceanothus is prized as a honey plant, and is used medicinally and ceremonially by many native American tribes (Moerman 1998). Many species of Ceanothus have been cultivated as ornamentals, most commonly known as wild-lilac or mountain-lilac. –62 spp. in N. Amer. (4 in AZ). REFERENCES: Kyle Christie, Michael Currie, Laura Smith Davis, Mar-Elise Hill, Suzanne Neal, and Tina Ayers, 2006 Vascular Plants of Arizona: Rhamnaceae. CANOTIA 2(1): 23-46.